Victoria University is characterised by the depth, consistency and effectiveness of our culture of domestic and international engagement. Our commitment to reciprocal, high-quality relationships springs from identifying and understanding the need for New Zealand to achieve sustainable development
Victoria has developed close ties with a wide range of businesses and government organisations, and several recent initiatives are aimed at improving the University’s engagement with industry. Victoria’s historic strength in public policy has been fully demonstrated by substantial contributions to major government projects, and entrepreneurship education is an emerging strength on which we intend to build. Victoria also gives high priority to engagement with Māori and Pacific communities.
We aim to produce graduates whose learning has been developed inside and outside of the classroom, experientially, and informed by a global perspective. Victoria University is one of New Zealand’s oldest and most prestigious tertiary institutions with a proud tradition of academic excellence. Discover more about Victoria University’s 115 years of rich history.
Its main campus is in Kelburn, a suburb on a hill overlooking the Wellington central business district, where its administration and humanities & social science and science faculties are based. The law and commerce and administration faculties are in the Pipitea Campus,[21] near Parliament Buildings, which consists of Rutherford House, the restored Old Government Buildings, and the West Wing of the Wellington Railway Station. A smaller campus in Te Aro[22] is the base for the architecture and design schools. The newest facility, the Victoria University Coastal Ecology Laboratory supports research programmes in marine biology and coastal ecology on Wellington's rugged south coast.
Day-to-day governance is in the hands of the University Council, which consists of 20 people: four elected by the Court of Convocation, three elected by the academic staff, one elected by the general staff, two appointed by the student union executive, four appointed by the Minister of Education, four selected by the Council itself, and the Vice-Chancellor. The Court of Convocation is composed of all graduates who choose to participate. Charles Wilson, at the time the chief librarian of the parliamentary library, was a member of the original council and its chairman for two years.
The New Zealand Electronic Text Centre (NZETC) is a digital library of significant New Zealand and Pacific Island texts and materials, and is arranged according to the library of Congress classification system. The library has two online repositories: the ResearchArchive is its open research repository, which makes the university's research freely available online and the RestrictedArchive, which is the university's private research repository and is accessible only to Victoria University staff and students.